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I understand that the majority of fantasy football leagues end at the conclusion of week 16. With that, blogs start handing out hypothetical fantasy awards, doing recaps, and starting to look ahead towards next season. Some of us are still playing this season, however.
I got into a debate with a friend of mine the other day about fantasy leagues that go 16 weeks versus leagues that don’t have their Super Bowl until week 17. We had different opinions on if the league Super Bowl should go on to the last week or not. What better way to settle the friendly discussion than by taking it to the masses?
One side argued that a downside to a 17 week league is that if you have players on teams that have a playoff spot locked up, that you might have to deal with players resting during the final week of the regular season. Suddenly you might find yourself in a Super Bowl with players you wouldn’t have normally even added to your team, let alone started. The counter to that is that the league is obviously more evenly balanced than any point in history and even though some teams have had playoff spots locked up for multiple weeks now, they want to keep their players in a rhythm and not give them too much time off before a possible bye week in the playoffs.
On the other side of the coin, every single fantasy owner I know plays in multiple leagues. The only reason for that is that the general fantasy playing public loves the game so much, they want more action. So why would commissioners and leagues rob their constituents of that extra week? A league that goes 17 weeks could be argued as a harder league to win. You have to play all the way down to the wire, just like some of the real life teams fighting for their playoff lives this week.
The majority of leagues that I’ve seen are 16 week leagues with the playoffs running from weeks 14-16. I have also been a part of leagues where there are three rounds of playoffs starting in week 14. I have heard of leagues that have their Super Bowl be a two week affair with the winner having highest total score of the two games.
What do you all think of 16 week league versus leagues that play all 17? My contact info is below, I would love to hear the general opinions on this, either in the comments, or on my Facebook and/or Twitter using the hashtag #16v17.
As always, I welcome your comments. If you think I’m wrong, I’m willing to listen. Just back it up with some facts and solid evidence. Thanks for reading and good luck this season.
Dustin Manko is an author at Rant Sports.com. Follow him on Twitter @DustinManko, ”Like” him on Facebook or add him to your network on Google
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